DreDaze wrote in post #18334264unfortunately the green area, which is where i normally head out, is Point Reyes National Seashore, and the Golden Gate National Recreation Area...but good info on the filing of flights beforehand...where you can and cannot go with a drone seems intimidating to figure out...i feel like if these national parks offered up a permit fee of $20 for a day or something they could make money, and allow people to shoot in there...i feel like the drones now don't make nearly as much noise as they did in the past...unless you are fairly close to one i don't think you can hear it as much...at least with my buddy's mavic

It's my understanding that you can't take off in a National Park but you can take off outside of it and fly into it.

flowrider wrote in post #18334427It's my understanding that you can't take off in a National Park but you can take off outside of it and fly into it.

You are not allowed to launch, land OR operate within boundaries of a NP. People can argue about language, but what matters is how it is currently being enforced, and the National Park Service says no.

I used an 18' extendable painters pole, took a $10 paint roller brush and cut the brush off, then threaded the metal at 20 per inch that comes out of the plastic handle (which just happens to be 1/4") then attached a ball mount to that. I use a wireless remote trigger which was also pretty cheap (I forget now but probably <$40 and I already had one). This is the pole setup.

For the pole stand I welded a flat piece of metal to a 3' metal pipe that the pole will fit into, I drive my car onto the flat piece of metal to hold it stable then lift the pole and camera and set it down into the 3' metal pipe. Now you have a stable setup that you don't have to hold onto so you can concentrate on capturing the picture. You can do all of this without the stand and I have but it's a beast and quite wobbly so I'm always afraid of dropping the whole thing!

I like to use my Canon 70D camera body because it has a tilt out screen that I can actually see the composition of the picture before I release the shutter.

This setup is the cheapest I could figure out at $ Per Foot of elevation. Not counting the camera and lenses of course, because I already owned the camera equipment. It would certainly be a different story if I was starting from scratch and just trying to get an elevation shot affordably. About $50 for the pole, $10 for the paint brush handle (needs to be cut and threaded), $40 for the remote trigger, $50 for the metal stand and pipe (needs to be welded) so about $150 for the whole thing and most likely less than $200 total including labor if you need it.

For me I had the metal, welder, remote trigger, camera ball mount, paint brush handle and threading dies so I only forked out the $50 for the painters pole making it a no brainer for me. The height with a nice wide angle lens (8m-24m range) is incredible. Most people think it is done with a drone.

Here are a couple example shots, you can see in the first one my shadow of the setup. Lens was at 11mm on a crop body so about 18mm for a full frame. I shot this one hand held without the metal stand. ps: be careful of electrical wires...

Is there a reason you bought the remote instead of just using the wifi on the 70D? I think it's pretty easy to see the composition, and fire the shutter with that...i like the idea of the mount to support it...just not sure if i'd be near my car...i've only taken the pole out a couple more times...still havent gone up the full distance

DreDaze wrote in post #18380587Is there a reason you bought the remote instead of just using the wifi on the 70D? I think it's pretty easy to see the composition, and fire the shutter with that...i like the idea of the mount to support it...just not sure if i'd be near my car...i've only taken the pole out a couple more times...still havent gone up the full distance

The reason is I didn't know it had it! Duh... I guess I'll have to look into that feature. I already had the remote setup with my 60D, now that I look back on it this shot was taken with my old 60D and not the 70D. These were taken at the full extension of 18' and the pole was hand held. It's just a balancing act, you have to concentrate 1st on the camera/pole setup and then worry about the picture composition later but never losing concentration on the pole. Kind of like driving while talking on your cell phone, come people just can't do it.

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